Canticle of Drabbles
by Serindrana
Summary: A collection of Dragon Age drabbles and ficlets. Various pairings as well as gen. Included is Fenris and Sebastian brotp, f!Surana/Orsino, Nathaniel/Cauthrien, Fenris/Isabela, and others. Last updated 9/24/2011
1. Table of Contents

_**Canticle of Drabbles**_

Table of Contents

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><p><em>Steady<em> [Fenris & Sebastian brotp] g

_Of Married Men and Trees_ [Alistair gen] g

_Instinct_ [Nathaniel Howe/Ser Cauthrien] g

_Andrastian Leanings_ [Fenris & Sebastian brotp] g

_To Protect_ [Fenris & Sebastian brotp; modern zombie AU] g

_The Third Drink_ [Aveline & Isabela brotp/hints of pairing] t

_Missing_ [Bethany gen] g

_First Meeting_ [Alistair/Cheese] g

_Gifts in the Offering_ [f!Surana/Orsino] t

_Of Fish and Ducks_ [Fenris/Isabela] t

_Opportunities, Lost and Gained_ [Fenris gen, fluff]

_Constant Vigilance_ [Bethany/Sebastian]


	2. Steady

_**Steady**_

_**[Fenris + Sebastian]**_

"I had thought," Fenris said slowly as he lifted the wine bottle to his lips as if it were not a fine Tevinter vintage, "that your vows would prohibit this sort of thing."

Sebastian, sitting across from him, shrugged. "I do not gamble. I play for fun. There is nothing forbidden about that." His brow furrowing, he plucked two cards from his hand and put them on the table between them.

They were sitting in Fenris's mansion. Sebastian had long ago given up on trying to convince Fenris to make at least a show of paying for the place or to fix it up so that the roof, at least, did not act as a sieve. Now they often sat in the early evenings, Sebastian answering questions about the Chant and playing a deft hand at the modified Wicked Grace they had come up with to allow for their missing compatriots.

Fenris had suggested, early on, that they go to the Hanged Man for more players. Sebastian had responded that if either of them had wanted Hawke or Varric or Isabela's company, they would already be at the Hanged Man. Instead, they played alone, with no gold on the table, Fenris polishing off at least two bottles of wine each meeting and Sebastian making it through another passage of the Chant.

Sebastian always won the imaginary pot, with a slight pang for his past and the feel of gold he didn't need clinking in his pocket after a game. That was something he didn't tell Fenris, and Fenris never asked.

That night, he won again, and as he rose, bidding the elf goodnight, Fenris tilted his head in thought.

"Yes?" Sebastian asked, gathering up the cards because he knew Fenris would forget and they would get water stained (more than they already were) or lost.

"You are very steady in your vows."

"I'm a loyal man," Sebastian responded with a soft laugh. "To my faith and my friends both."

Fenris nodded, leaning back. "Next week, then?"

"If Hawke does not need us both sooner, then yes- next week."


	3. Of Married Men and Trees

**_Of Married Men and Trees_**

**_[Alistair + M!Tabris]_**

"You were almost married?"

"I like to think that I actually was." Darrian Tabris's smile was tight as he leaned back against the tree he sat up in. Alistair watched him from below, sitting on the ground with his legs bent at the knee. His feet were swollen and he was grateful for Darrian's suggestion of stopping for a long break, but he hadn't meant it to go quite like this.

Speaking of childhoods and homes had led somehow to how Darrian had been recruited into the Wardens, and Alistair wasn't sure he liked where the story was going.

But Darrian didn't seem inclined to finish it. The tree held his attention more. They are a week out of Redcliffe, a month out of Lothering, but they had just recently reached a place where the trees were easy and safe to climb. Darrian spent more and more time up in them whenever they were stopped. Leliana had taken to teasing him, and Alistair had made more than his fair share of comments, but slowly, he was coming to understand.

There were no trees in the Alienage, none except the one Darrian called _vhenadahl_, so of course Darrian wanted to know what they were like. Alistair had scraped his hands and calves on tree bark as a child even living in Eamon's home, had fallen out of many of them. Darrian hadn't had that.

He'd had a lot of pain; that was what Alistair understood.

He felt foolish, so foolish, for asking half the questions he's put to the elf. This was only the latest of a long string of placing his foot firmly in his mouth. Perhaps, he thought, he should take up praying again, if only to ask the Maker to plant his toes firmly on the soil and out of any orifices.

"I'm sorry," he tried. "We don't need to talk about it. At all, really, if you don't want. I mean, not that I wouldn't listen, but-"

An acorn, green and half-grown, dropped onto his head and he looked up just in time for another to hit him squarely on the nose.

"Hey!"

Darrian laughed, a rare sound from the man but a welcome one all the same, a genuine one. "Apology accepted," he said, hopping down the larger branches until he had to clamber down the trunk, long fingers wrapping around smaller handholds. He added nothing about his past, about talking, about wanting to be heard.

Alistair scratched at the back of his head, thinking of all the times that Darrian had asked him to go on, had said that his ramblings were okay. It didn't seem fair.

"Right, well," he tried, but Darrian shook his head and clapped a hand on Alistair's shoulder as he passed.

"How are your feet? We should get moving again."

"But it's only been an hour!" he complained, feeling like a little boy even though he knew that Darrian was a good two years younger than he. But the man, for all his slight, young features, is large blue eyes and pale red hair, his quickness and his lack of brute strength, was becoming a strong leader, a powerful one, and Alistair knew he would follow no matter if he had to crawl from lack of available feet.

Darrian knew it, too. He grabbed one of Alistair's wrists (his other hand holding a bunch of leaves, a few more acorns) and hauled him up to standing. "Half an afternoon. The sun is an hour's trip from the horizon. Only three months away from Denerim and evenI know that."

"The wisdom of a married man," Alistair said, and then winced.

But Darrian only grinned. "Exactly."


	4. Instinct

_**Instinct**_

**_[Nathaniel Howe/Ser Cauthrien]_**

"It's a matter of instinct." His hands settle on her hips. He could correct her stance, but it's impeccable. He could touch her hand and pull her draw back further, but she's strong enough to handle the bow he's lent her. All he can do it stand close behind her, voice in her left ear as she draws back to her right.

"Instinct," she repeats, eyes flicking to him and her drawing arm trembling with the momentary distraction. She is used to heavy swords and heavy armor, cloud-shooting in the army, not training an arrow on a single target. He wonders again at the twists of fate that have brought them together, a Warden and one of the fiercest lieutenants Maric's Shield has ever known, her willing to still and listen to him for instruction.

"Yes. You need to trust yourself. It's the quickest way. You could sight every single shot, but in a battle, you won't have the time. At least, not always." He leans closer, lips pressing to her drawn-back hair in a brief kiss before he touches her hand where she holds the arrow steady. "Trust yourself. Just move. Focus, but not too much."

"I can't focus," she says, and he glimpses the twitch and curve of a small smile, "if you're standing this close to me."

"Sure you can." He chuckles, hands sliding over the supple leather clothing her hips and thighs. "I'm sure darkspawn will be more distracting than this."

"Do you _want_ me to shoot you, Nathaniel?"

He bows his head, conceding the point, but he only steps back, not removing his hands.

"Five shots," he says. "As fast as you can. Aim for the target but do not hesitate." And then he releases her, crossing his arms and standing back to watch.

When the _thud-thud-thud_ of arrows striking the hay-stuffed target dies away, there are three near the center, better than her one out of ten just that morning.

"Instinct," she repeats, and when she nods, he knows she understands.


	5. Andrastian Leanings

_**Andrastian Leanings**_

**_[Fenris + Sebastian]_**

In the brief moment after a battle, while Hawke and Isabela joke about sticking things in people, while he catches his breath and rolls tension from his shoulder, Sebastian hears a murmur and turns. Fenris stands over the body of a woman - a girl, really, Coterie, fifteen at most - and stumbles over words he recognizes well.

"The Chant?" he asks and Fenris flinches.

"Yes," he says. "Your Chant."

"It's not just mine." Sebastian smiles sadly, then goes to join him. "_Rest at the Maker's hand, and be forgiven._"

Fenris bows his head and adds his voice.


	6. To Protect

_A/N_: Written at the request of Dictatorships on Tumblr - she wanted a drabble with Fenris and Sebastian as bros, in a modern zombie uprising AU.

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><p><strong><em>To Protect<em>**

"Protect the Aggregio!"

Fenris always manages to sound so serious, so dire, and Sebastian just shakes his head, taking his time to line up his sights. One shot, one kill; it's so much cleaner than Fenris' method of swinging a chainsaw around as if it were a sword. And it gives him the space he needs to keep his head clear, to ask for the Maker's aid in taking down the foul creatures who threaten His children.

Of course, perhaps there are more productive uses of his time and skill than watching from the rafters the door into the liquor store while Fenris gathers up every bottle (six, this time, and Fenris looks gleeful (at least, Sebastian thinks it's glee, because Fenris is nearly smiling) at the outcome), but friends are the most important thing left in this blighted world.

A zombie breaks from the mass trying to crowd into the building and runs fast for Fenris who is, of course, right near the precious Aggregio, his chainsaw a pull away from running (if they're lucky). Sebastian frowns; he can't get the shot, not fast enough.

And so he drops from the rafters and onto the creature's head, knife in hand driving deep into the zombie's rotting eye socket. A moment later and he's fighting to scramble back up to his perch, but Fenris has his blade running and takes his turn rushing the door, beginning to clear a path.

The Aggregio, thank the Maker, is unharmed.


	7. The Third Drink

_A/N: Written at the request of Khamsin on Tumblr, for the prompt Isabela and Aveline being lady bros._

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><p><strong><em>The Third Drink<em>**

There are a lot of things Isabela will grant of the captain of the guard. Her hands are strong and firm and _man_ hands in the best of ways (and the worst, says the memory of a right hook to the jaw she had been unable to sidestep during a bar fight); she's a good distraction in pitched battle; she plays Wicked Grace and Diamondback with enough skill that sometimes it almost seems like cheating doesn't matter -

And she can always, always, drink Isabela under the table.

The ritual starts about six months after the wedding (a nice enough thing, even if Isabela didn't stay for long and left soon after the ceremony was complete with a rather handsome mercenary that said he'd worked with Aveline her first year in Kirkwall). Aveline shows up at the Hanged Man, settles kitty cornered from her against the bar, and orders a round, one for herself and one for _that slattern over there who never changes her kerchief, let alone her smalls_. Isabela toasts her. Aveline doesn't look up.

It's only on the third drink that they start talking.

And from there it's anything goes, healthy doses of jabs and insults and innuendo, critiques of sex lives, intimate details and intimate threats. Five drinks in and Isabela starts going the pleasant sort of hazy that she only gets around good friends, feeling safe and welcome and wanted even while Aveline finishes every phrase with _whore_.

Nine drinks and the room starts spinning and it's Aveline who drags her back to her rented room. It's Aveline who tucks her into bed and Isabela makes a joke about kids and motherhood and Aveline just quirks a brow and tells her to sleep.

She leaves a cup of water by the bed before she heads for the stairs.

Somehow, in the morning, Isabela has a horrid headache and an empty bed, but the bed is oddly warm.

Ask


	8. Missing

_A/N: Written for Weird-Friendless-Kid on Tumblr, for the prompt, "Bethany being upset that she missed her sister's wedding to Sebastian, as well as everything that has gone on in her family and friends' lives"_

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><p><strong><em>Missing<em>**

"The wedding was two weeks ago."

Bethany thumbs the letter in her hand, paper stiff and formal and filled with her sister's handwriting. It's gotten better since they left Lothering. Mother must have taught her, or else she has been taking lessons in how to be Kirkwall's Champion and resident enchanting noble. Perhaps it is her husband who taught her. But there are little loops and lines and hooks that Bethany knows are only Marian's, and it makes the letter all the harder to read.

"She didn't invite me," she says, voice flat because anything else will invite tears.

There's a creak of leather and metal as Knight-Captain Cullen shifts where he stands. "No," he says. "We expected a petition for your presence."

"Would the knight-commander have granted it?"

Cullen does not respond. Her heart sinks, though she doesn't know whether he would have said _yes_, and she has missed this because of her sister's lack of hope, or _no_, and she has missed this finally because of her decision to turn herself over to the Circle. It had seemed like the best idea at the time. With her sister gone, she had learned just how much Marian's sword and coin had kept the templars at bay. Mother had let slip about how much coin Marian handed over to various bribes each month. It had been unbearable, knowing that she kept them on the run and took the gold Marian worked for each and ever day.

She had thought she was making the right decision.

And then Leandra had been killed; Leandra had died, her mother had _died_, and Bethany had been sitting in the Gallows, studying, learning, beginning slowly to teach. Her mother had been murdered and Marian had been the one to arrange the funeral, the pyre, the flowers.

Bethany had only sat in the Gallows chapel and prayed alone.

She has missed so much. She remembers, vaguely, the man who is now her brother-in-law. She remembers blue eyes and a straight shot, gleaming armor, an accent. She remembers bits and pieces. _Vengeance. _But that is all. She only knows his name because of the whispers around her, that the Champion of Kirkwall has taken a husband before Andraste.

Bethany stares at her hands, at the thin cord of red around her wrist. The scarf Leandra had given Bethany when she reached her sixteenth nameday is all but gone, burned in symbolic mourning, only a small sliver kept to remind her. She has family, beyond these walls; she has an uncle, a sister, a new brother. She has a home, too, a family estate she has never seen more than the cellars to.

Her eyes burn hot and heavy, and she catches her finger beneath the cord, snapping it.

Remembering the outside and what has gone before is too painful. She hands the fabric and the parchment to the knight-captain and with a thick swallow murmurs, "Please, burn these?"

He nods.


	9. First Meeting

_A/N: _Written for maybethings on tumblr, prompt being the first time that Alistair encounters cheese.

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><p><em><strong>First Meeting<strong>_

Alistair is four years old and squawling and Teagan isn't sure what he's supposed to do. Eamon has rode down to the town to meet with the mayor about a land issue, and Teagan, guest Teagan, Teagan who was only spending time with Alistair until Alistair needed actual minding, is faced with a crying red-faced boy who refuses to settle down.

"'m hungry!" Alistair protests, and Teagan just stares at him in confusion.

"The kitchens-"

"Wanna eat dinner."

"Dinner? But it's only three-"

"Dinner! With Uncle Teagan!"

The child is insistent, terrifyingly so, and after another look around for a nurse or a playmate or _something_, Teagan hefts the child up in his arm and carries him to the kitchen. Alistair protests, but Teagan assures him that they can have a nice dinner together _not_ in the dining hall.

Alistair is pouting when he puts him down.

Teagan casts about for something to feed the boy. There's a little familiar ceramic pot nearby and he brings it over, opening it to show Alistair. "Marmalade?" he asks.

He is met by the most flat and unamused stare he has ever received, and it's from a four-year-old.

"No. Not dinner."

Teagan bites down a sigh. He can't very well go and have the cooks roast a chicken or make some other 'dinner' food. He is at a loss, wondering if he just gives the boy some diluted ale if he'll quiet, when his eyes fall on a wheel of cheese resting, with only a small wedge missing, a few tables over.

"Hold on," he says, and goes to cut Alistair a piece.

It's a local cave-aged, one that he knows Eamon ordered just for him, because Eamon only eats the soft Orlesian-style cheeses, a preference he picked up in the Free Marches. He cuts off the thinnest, smallest hunk, and returns to Alistair. He holds it out and Alistair eyes it dubiously.

But the child takes it, nibbles it, and his eyes go wide.

Teagan relaxes as soon as that wide stare is joined by a vibrant smile, and as he goes to cut more, Alistair begins talking, babbling, words falling out in an incoherent mess that boils down to the fact that cheese is truly the Maker's gift, and that his short life is now complete.


	10. Gifts in the Offering

_A/N: _Written for madsabroo on tumblr, prompt "F!Warden/Orsino".

_Rating_: T

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><p><strong><em>Gifts in the Offering<em>**

Neria Surana stares out at the gardens of the Cumberland Circle, tap-tapping her fingers against the rail. It is strange, being crowded in by walls again in a place that hums with magic and the voices of mages and apprentices, the creak of templar armor. It is strange and gives her pause, stirs nerves long soothed by open skies and rolling fields, even if those fields were stained with blood and those skies heavy with storming clouds.

But she can leave at any time.

When the invitation from Wynne came to attend the College of Magi, Neria almost burned the letter. But it was a letter from Wynne, and so she kept it, she considered it, and finally, she accepted. She crossed Thedas to reach Nevarra, and now stands as if she never left the Circle.

Perhaps it would have been prudent to wear her Warden insignia, to mark her as not leashed, but Neria has always preferred soft and light robes.

"The Hero of Ferelden?" comes a Marcher-accented voice behind her, and she turns with a frown creasing her brow.

"Perhaps," she replies, in obfuscation learned from diplomacy and too many walks in the Fade. The man who addresses her watches her too, with wide green eyes beneath a broad forehead and a receeding, greying hairline.

He holds out a hand. "Orsino. First-enchanter of the Kirkwall Circle."

She takes it only slowly, trying not to enjoy how his hand does not engulf hers like a human's would. "Neria Surana."

"The Hero of Ferelden indeed," he says, smiling and inclining his head, then letting her hand drop. "There have been rumors you would be attending."

"I'm not sure why there's such interest in me. I have no research to present." None that the Circle or Chantry can hear, at least. She has spent the last year working, uncomfortably, with the Architect. She knows more than she has ever wished to, and whispers come now from the Vimmark Mountains, rumors that she knows she shouldn't have heard.

"You're the most famous mage in all of Thedas. That is reason enough, Warden."

"Neria," she corrects, leaning back against the railing and over it enough that she can feel the sun on her skin, gone tan from long days spent in its rays.

"Neria," he repeats with another small incline of his head, a minor bow.

She studies the sculpted curves of his staff while he adjusts his robes behind her. The templars have been kind enough to give her a private room, though they stand guard just behind it - in this case, because Orsino has followed her to it.

It happened over dinner.

Five days of stealing moments in the curving colonnade halls bordering the large central gardens led to a discussion over dinner in heavy, thick words, heated by wine and passion, about theory and practice of spells, of fire, of animating the dead. He had leaned across the table towards her and she had leaned in as well. She had felt the warmth of his breath barely touching her cheek, though it could just have well been from the candle between them.

They talked long after the dining hall had cleared, the other visiting mages moving to late lectures or the gardens to talk and relax.

She invited him back to her room - for a respite from templar eyes, she told herself.

She told herself that until she settled on the couch beside him and slid a hand over his chest, along his shoulder, and up. She traced his jawline and kissed his lips, and he sighed into her mouth and reached for the hem of her robe.

_I give you this - privacy and freedom_, she'd whispered as an offering, and she had felt him shudder beneath her hands.


	11. Of Fish and Ducks

_A/N: Written for Maybethings on tumblr, prompt was Isabela, Fenris, and a rubber duck._

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><p><strong><em>Of Fish and Ducks<em>**

**_[Fenris/Isabela]_**

"No."

Isabela gazed up at him placidly from the tub for a moment, then sighed and flopped back against the rim. "You need a bath. Come on."

"I do not _need a bath_," he said, shaking his head and crossing his arms over his bared chest.

"If _I_ need one after that little stunt we just pulled, then you _definitely_ do."

"Fish," he muttered, and she couldn't help but laugh, stretching as she did so.

"Exactly, come here. And-" Isabela leaned out of the tub, turning and giving him a show (that he didn't make a comment on but she knew he watched), "I have two presents for you."

"Presents?"

"Mm, presents. Gifts! The best kind, the ones I didn't have to pay for either."

Fenris sighed, and behind her she heard the sound of him rolling his leggings off, then the splash and rise of warm water against her ribs, tickling the underside of her breats, as he slipped in. The tub was small and he soon wrapped one arm around her.

"What gifts?" he rumbled, close to her ear, and she laughed, looking back over her shoulder.

She tossed one of the objects behind her and into the water.

Fenris snorted.

"A _duck_?"

"A yellow one!" Isabela replied, leaning further out so that he would pull her back in. As he settled her against his chest, his other hand picking up the yellow, floating toy, she dropped a fistful of colored, scented salts into the water.

Fenris paused.

"This smells-" he started, then hummed, pressing his nose and lips to Isabela's neck. "This smells like Seheron."

"Happy Feastday, you lout," she said.


	12. Opportunities, Lost and Gained

_A/N: Written for dictatorships on tumblr, prompt was Fenris and a bunny being cute._

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><p><strong><em>Opportunities, Lost and Gained<em>**

**_[Fenris gen fluff]_**

"What is _that_?" Garrett asked, staring. His eyes were wider than the antics of blood mages had ever made them, and Fenris shifted uncomfortably.

"A rabbit." It was the truth, but the words still took effort to get out. The small, fluffy creature wriggled in his lap, then lept from it and bounded a few feet towards the Champion of Kirkwall. The Champion retreated.

"Well, _yes_. But Andraste's _arse_, what is it doing here?"

"I- intended to have it for dinner last night. They were selling them in Lowtown. And then it got loose."

"Got loose," Garrett said, fingers twitching at his sides as the rabbit came close enough to sniff at his boot. "_Got loose_."

"I found it in my room this morning, going through my things. It has eaten all of my elfroot." He wouldn't admit out loud that he had grown fond of the small, brown field rabbit, with its soft fur and uncommon boldness. It was certainly better than the cats that the abomination seemed to attract, and kept its distance without being cruel.

Plus it ate the vegetables that Orana was always bringing over, as if Fenris himself would eat them.

"You have a pet. You have a _bunny_. Maker, Fenris, I can't- ah! Ah, get it- get it _off_-"

It had settled onto Hawke's boot and was attempting to go to sleep. Fenris chuckled, then uncurled from his spot on the floor to go retrieve his little pest.


	13. Constant Vigilance

_A/N: Written for a prompt generator challenge on tumblr. Prompt was constant vigilance. Can be read as the prologue to "Anything of Weight", found in my works list._

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><p><strong><em>Constant Vigilance<em>**

**_[Bethany/Sebastian]_**

She likes to pretend he doesn't know.

It's silly. He knows like everybody who has ever seen her fight knows, like everybody who has been close to her brother knows. He has seen her conjure ice from the air to melt into drinkable water and he has felt her patch his wounds with little teasing, imprecise threads of magic. They have been deep below the Vimmark Mountains for five days now, and there is no way he doesn't know.

She has even told him outright, when he called her Lady Hawke and her heart lodged in her throat and her pulse hammered in her ears, trying to push him away before she could find a tiny shard of hope in his affections.

But when he continues to flatter her, when he sits beside her when they make camp and she fumbles with flint and tinder to light a fire like any normal girl, she pretends. She's not a mage, or he doesn't know she's a mage, or he isn't or wasn't a dedicated Chantry brother. It's a dangerous line to walk, pretending. Souls have been lost with the need to give in to fantasy. She always tries to face the truth, strives to understand reality, but there in the dark with howls of darkspawn in the distance and the threat of something lurking in Garrett's blood, she pretends that this could happen.

The sunlight, when they emerge, will burn it all away - and if the literal sun does not, the waiting steel of templar escorts on her return to Kirkwall will, the flare of the Chantry bright and irrefutable.

But for now, she walks that edge. On the one side she balances the knowledge that it will never be. On the other she lets hope fly. It is a strict balance, one she must enforce, but seeing her father's memory flitting on the edges of the prison keeps her confident. She has been taught well. She knows how to be vigilant, how to control herself.

She only hopes that Sebastian knows as well.


End file.
